Reconnected Farms Mushrooms
Supplier to PFC since 2020
Location: Dorchester, Iowa
69 miles from PFC Rochester
Reconnected Farms of Dorchester, Iowa has been supplying fresh mushrooms to PFC—Rochester since 2020. Farmer Tanner Sanness specializes in oyster mushrooms and lions mane mushrooms. Oyster mushrooms are common in Asian cuisines, while Lions Mane mushrooms are less well known.
Tanner finds that both varieties are delicious and have excellent health benefits. They’re also easy to grow. Following some market research, he found that the mushrooms aren’t easy to find in area stores and that they would be a good niche market for his business.
The health benefits were a big factor in Tanner’s decision to diversify into mushroom farming, “I am a self proclaimed health nut,” he says, “and was really interested in lions mane mushrooms due to their health benefits but couldn’t find them in local groceries and decided to grow them for myself which led me to growing them commercially.”
Reconnected Farm has about 400 to 500 acres of other crops, such as oats, corn, soybeans. His father manages the plant world and Tanner looks after the fungi. They are an organic farm, although Tanner notes that his mushrooms have not gone through the certification process yet. He uses all organic substrates and certified organic mushroom spawn and they add no chemicals in the process. They plan on getting certified in the future.
The mushrooms are a recent addition to this diversified farm. The farm is a small family operation, with only with father and sister working with him on the farm. They’ve been farming in the Dorchester area since the 1850s.
Mushroom farming is completely unlike any other type of farming, Tanner reports. “Mushrooms are a completely different kingdom [of organism] than animals or plants.” They grow mushrooms year round in a climate controled room. As Tanner describes it, they add mycelium, the living organism of the mushroom, into a bag of sterilized growing media. They then seal the bag and let the mycelium completely colonize the bag for a month before opening the bag up and putting it into the climate controled room. The room has a very high humidity that mushrooms respond well to.
Considering how fungi farming compares to crop farming, Tanner says, “there are more differences than similarities. Mushrooms have completely different needs than plants and animals. My favorite part of mushroom farming is there is a lot less reliance on expensive equipment, such as tractors.”
In order to get up to speed on mushroom cultivation, Tanner took a course on mushroom growing from Cornell University, and did his own book research and visits with other farms growing fungi.
If you’re unfamiliar with cooking with oyster or lions mane mushrooms, Tanner suggests that you check out their website at reconnectedfarms.com for recipes.